Boeing flies fully hydrogen fueled plane

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I guess we can discuss this
http://www.defensetech.org/archives/004103.html

 

[Orionblamblam]

http://www.defensetech.org/archives/004103.html

FTFA:

I think this is awesome. Tell me why fuel cells aren't the answer for the dwindling carbon-based energy supplies.

Because hydrogen takes a lot of energy to create and process, dumbass.

 

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it does today and it isn't cheap to store either. that is precisely where high temperature reactors come in . frankly speaking they are the only hope we have today of making hydrogen production worthwhile. of course storage requires research.

 

[BAROBA]

But on a cosmic scale free hydrogen makes up around 98% of all matter....
It is just a ironic fact that we live on a planet devoid of free hydrogen.
But there is plenty of bonded hydrogen, in water for example.
But as Orionblamblam pointed out, it takes more energy to make it, then it delivers.

 

[avatar]

yup and one of the ways to get that hydrogen in water is High temperature electrolysis .. which is a research feature for Gen IV reactors

 

[Orionblamblam]

yup and one of the ways to get that hydrogen in water is High temperature electrolysis .. which is a research feature for Gen IV reactors

Problem is even if you could produce free hydrogen gas it *still* wouldn't make much economic sense. You'd need to repalce every vehicle and every engine on the planet. Nice, dense hydrocarbons make for the best fuels, and need not have any recognizable environmental impact.

 

[avatar]

Problem is even if you could produce free hydrogen gas it *still* wouldn't make much economic sense. You'd need to repalce every vehicle and every engine on the planet. Nice, dense hydrocarbons make for the best fuels, and need not have any recognizable environmental impact.

Shrug.

Populous countries such as India and China have much fewer cars today than the uh beeeg United States Of A . So if indeed hydrogen came for free, just make future *production* vehicles run on hydrogen. The two most populous countries can afford to gradually phase out their rickety old fleets , because there aren't that many any way . For the U.S of A ... :
Basically what needs to be understood is that an *optimal* mix is required. It is not a case of one or the other. Hydrogen and "cleaner" fossil fuel vehicles ( mostly hybrid) will probably co-exist in the future.

 

[mz]

Hydrogen is not good for this. You need to produce it and store it, both inefficient for flight vehicles, they are the last place where one would want to get rid of hydrocarbon fuels. Nothing but a PR stunt.